THE BUSINESS BLOG: 7 REASONS WHY HAVING ONE IS A SOCIAL MEDIA MUST

21% of marketers say that social media has become more important to their company over the past six months, of which Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn seem to have been paid the most attention. At a time when having a strong social media presence is becoming increasingly important, the benefit of including a blog in those plans is something that’s often overlooked. Yet when you consider that on average, companies that have a blog receive 97% more inbound links than those that don’t and around 61% of US online consumers said they have made a purchase based on recommendations from a blog, it’s clear there are several advantages of investing in one.

Why should your company create and maintain a blog and isn’t it something people were doing two years ago?

First of all there’s a lot of business out there who’ve already set up a blog and who’re reaping the benefit of getting in there early. However, there are still a significant number of businesses that are yet to invest in content marketing or social media, and for those a blog is a good place to start.

How will this benefit my business?

There are numerous advantages to having a company blog perhaps the most obvious is the Searchbenefit:

Google’s numerous algorithm changes are all swaying in favour of unique and quality content. Providing you invest some time into creating original articles (rather than re-purposing other online material) then you’ll be making Google extremely happy, continue to publish useful content regularly and you could soon see your natural rankings shift in your favour.

Depending on the layout of your website, it’s more than likely that there’s little opportunity to include a good variety of keywords without over-stuffing pages. Having a blog will enable you to introduce new keywords online instantly and insert long-tail phrases that may have looked out of place on site.

Guest blogging is becoming a widely used tool for SEOs to develop relationships with other bloggers and gain natural links back to site. If you’ve already got an established blog then fellow bloggers will be able to see that as a business you know what you’re talking about and are committed to creating unique copy. No blogger wants to work with a site using black hat methods, by having a blog you’ll be making your SEOs job that little bit easier.

As social search evolves, having a blog can play a large role in helping your business develop and present its Brand:

Writing about industry happenings and other topics that are relevant to your brand will help establish you as an expert in your field. If you continue to create interesting and thought provoking articles then you’ll soon build up an inventory of relevant content, providing a great reference point for consumers and other industry experts, and ultimately increasing new traffic and returning visitors.

Your content efforts don’t have to be limited to just your blog. Creating your own content provides you with a wealth of information to use across other social media platforms. Use a piece of content to start a conversation on Facebook and Twitter and you’ll be extending your knowledge to even more consumers.

If you’re writing about topics that are relevant to your business and your customers then you’ll slowly begin to attract a regular audience. If you’re transparent with your copy, sharing experiences and real opinion then you’re positioning your brand, not only as an expert but as a business that readers can trust.

Providing you allow comments on your articles, a blog is a really good way of getting useful feedback from your audience without being intrusive. If you’re writing about a topic that you don’t think will get much attention then you can ask that people leave their thoughts in the comments below, this will help you get a better understanding of what’s working and what’s not.

Top tips for new bloggers…

Use a free blogging platform to get you going, WordPress is the most common and one of the easiest to get set up.

Make sure you have a clear idea about the type of content you want to publish on your blog before you start writing.

Create a content calendar so you know what days you’ll be publishing articles.

Set aside time to research and write your articles.

Enable commenting and social sharing across your blog – it’ll help spread the word.

Don’t just re-use others work. If you’ve seen a story you like, it’s fine to write about it but make sure you put your own spin on it.

Always write for your reader – think about who’s reading your articles, who’s your customer and what do they want to read?

Share your articles across your social networks.

Got any more tips? Share your tips to help budding bloggers in the comments below or tweet us